Justin Baldoni‘s lawsuit against Blake Lively was dismissed by a federal judge in New York on Monday.
The It Ends With Us costars have been in a heated legal feud since 2024.
In his motion, Judge Lewis J. Liman dismissed Baldoni’s $400 million countersuit against Lively, her husband, Ryan Reynolds, the couple’s publicist, Leslie Sloane, as well as Baldoni’s defamation claim against The New York Times.
“The alleged facts indicate that the Times reviewed the available evidence and reported, perhaps in a dramatized manner, what it believed to have happened,” the opinion said. “The Times had no obvious motive to favor Lively’s version of events.”
Baldoni has until June 23 to refile some of his claims.
Lively’s lawyers, Esra Hudson and Mike Gottlieb, called the dismissal a “total victory and complete vindication for Blake Lively, along with those that Justin Baldoni and the Wayfarer Parties dragged into their retaliatory lawsuit, including Ryan Reynolds, Leslie Sloane and The New York Times.”
“As we have said from day one, this ‘$400 million’ lawsuit was a sham, and the Court saw right through it,” the statement continued. “We look forward to the next round, which is seeking attorneys’ fees, treble damages and punitive damages against Baldoni, [Steve] Sarowitz, [Melissa] Nathan, and the other Wayfarer Parties who perpetrated this abusive litigation.”
Good Morning America has reached out to Baldoni’s lawyers for comment.
Lively first filed a complaint on Dec. 20, 2024, against Baldoni with the California Civil Rights Department, accusing him of sexual harassment on the set of the film, which he also directed.
Baldoni responded on Dec. 31, 2024, with the now-dismissed lawsuit against the Times for libel and false light invasion of privacy after it published the article about Lively’s California complaint.
The lawsuit claimed the Times, which included in its article alleged text messages and email exchanges between Baldoni’s publicists Jennifer Abel and Melissa Nathan and the newspaper, had relied on “cherry-picked” and altered communications, with details “stripped of necessary context and deliberately spliced” to “mislead.”
Baldoni’s attorney, Bryan Freedman, said at the time that the Times “cowered to the wants and whims of two powerful ‘untouchable’ Hollywood elites, disregarding journalistic practices and ethics once befitting of the revered publication by using doctored and manipulated texts and intentionally omitting texts which dispute their chosen PR narrative.”
A New York Times spokesperson told GMA at the time that they “plan to vigorously defend against the lawsuit.”
That same day, Lively formalized details from her California complaint into a lawsuit against Baldoni and other defendants for sexual harassment.
Baldoni has denied the allegations.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
Copyright © 2025, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.
